Úrsula is still overseeing the family. She still plans for José
Arcadio (III) to be Pope, although he has not even been sent to
seminary yet. Her eyesight is almost gone, but her other four
senses have been heightened immensely as has her clairvoyance.
It is now that she begins to understand each of the members of her
family’s motives. Aureliano cried in her womb because he could
not love. Amaranta was not troubled by bitterness but by a
conflict between measureless love and invincible cowardice.

José Arcadio (III) is finally sent of to seminary. Aureliano
Segundo and Amaranta take Meme to school so that she can learn
to play the clavichord. Fernanda begins to assert herself as the
new authority in the house as Úrsula is becoming relegated to the
shadows. José Arcadio Segundo takes a job as foreman of at the
banana company, for which Fernanda bans him from the house.
The rules applied by Fernanda are so strict that Aureliano
Segundo moves in with Petra. Fernanda, hoping to shame him
publicly, sends the rest of his belongings to Petra’s, but Aureliano
Segundo is so happy to be liberated that he throws a three-day
long party. His own sexual fervor returns to that of his youth, and
his animals are multiplying faster than ever. This increase in
money and livestock earns him more money and allows him to
carouse constantly.

Fernanda’s house is now haunted by three living ghosts (Colonel Aureliano
Buendía, Úrsula, and Amaranta) and one dead ghost (José
Arcadio Buendía). Amaranta is weaving her shroud; some say that
she weaves during the say and unweaves at night to defeat solitude, but
instead Amaranta is nurturing it.

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José Arcadio Segundo comes back to the house and meets with
the colonel. Aureliano Buendía is still making fishes; he begins in
the morning and when he has made twenty-five, he melts them
down and starts over.

Aureliano Buendía is startled away from his fishes by a glint of
light and the sound of the circus. He goes to the door to watch the
parade and then urinates on the chestnut tree. He his found dead
the next day.

Notes

The second generation (Segundo) of Aureliano/José Arcadio is
replacing the first. José Arcadio Segundo is aligned with the
banana company and its corruption. Aureliano Segundo is still
split between his wife and his mistress. Likewise, Fernanda has
replaced Úrsula (whose clairvoyance is heightened but presence is
fading) and Rebeca and Amaranta have almost vanished.

The previous generation haunts the house. History weighs heavily
on the family but there is never the conscious realization that
family history is cyclic.

Aureliano dies in conflict with his brother, urinating on the tree
that he haunts. There is no resolution between them, even in
death.